emotional development and temperament Flashcards
affect
outward expression of emotions
can/do babies interpret and experience emotion
researchers asked mothers if their baby experiences emotion, almost all say their baby can
weaknesses
- interpretation bias from parents
- mothers can claim their baby looks happy but how can we tell if they are actually feeling happiness
physiological methods to measuring babies emotion
-skin conductance for arousal
which emotions in infants are we better at interpreting
positive emotions
-fear and anger often get confused
what are primary emotions
basic emotions present at birth e.g contentment, interest, disgust, distress
4-8 weeks: true smile (social) from pleasure
2-7 months: anger, sadness, joy, surprise, fear
(biological influence: invariant sequence of emergence across cultures)
what are secondary emotions
complex emotions form around second yr+
-embarrassment, guilt, shame, envy, pride
-parental influence e.g if parents are particularly expressive of pride for example
-when children first learn these emotions they only express them in the presence of adults
-less biological underpinning
understanding emotions
-heavily linked to language: when children speak about emotion we have a greater understanding of their emotional knowledge
when do children start using emotional words
-around 18 months
-increases greatly in 3rd year
(children may simply learn scripts for how to behave/react)
when are emotional conflicts understood (mixed emotions)
Harris 1983
-at age 6+
what are emotional display rules
culturally defined rules about when and where to express emotions
-they are learnt rules that change over time
-hard for children to learn these rules
how do children learn emotional display rules
through our parents, social training: adults respond selectively to babies emotional displays
-social training is culture specific
what is social training
socially acceptable emotional displays shaped from early childhood
-3 yr olds have limited abilities to hide their true feelings
-as children get older they become better at lying/masking
what is key to following emotional display rules
emotional self regulation and ability to lie/ mask emotions
Dans 1995 theory about emotional display rules
females are generally faster at learning these rules and being able to regulate emotions
what are the strategies babies and children use to regulate emotions
-6 month: turn away from aversive stimuli
-1 yr: rocking, moving away, chewing on objects
-toddlers: distract themselves
-2-6 yrs: parental guidance and verbal help that becomes internalised
recognition and interpretation of emotion at different ages
-first month: babies can discriminate between adult facial expressions of primary emotions
-2-3 months: babies smile at human faces more than inanimate objects (Nelson et al 2006)
-first yr: infants able to recognise emotional changes in adult expression
what is social referencing
looking to others to see how they react to a new environment/object to guide your experience
-7-10 months: look to adults of uncertain
-toddlers + older children: adults initiate conversations about emotions
(children show more developed emotional understanding/secondary emotions if brought up by parents that discuss emotions with them
what did Fabes et al 2001 find
nursery children who use emotion related words are more popular
recognition and interpretation tests
infants and young children expect adults to synchronise emotions and are sensitive to emotions e.g still face experiment
what is temperament
tendency to respond in a certain way across situations (precurser of personality)
what are the five major attributes in babies
activity level, irritability, soothability, fearfulness, sociability
theories of temperament and stability
Caspi and Silva 1995: activity level, irritability, sociability and shyness are moderately stable from infancy to adolescence
Kagan 1992: behavioural inhibition (dislike of unfamiliar) is stable from early infancy to school age +
temperamental profiles thomas and chess 1977
-40% babies fall in easy profile (predictable pattern of eating + sleeping)
-10% fall into difficult (unpredictable patterns)
-15% slow to warm up (slow to find routine)
what are temperamental profiles dependent on
child rearing practices
-persistence of temperamental traits is dependent on child rearing practices
